Figure toy with variable sounding means

ABSTRACT

The present invention relates to a figure toy which will move its mouth and emit a sound when the toy is manipulated in a certain manner. The sound is produced by a plurality of vibrating reeds each of which is mounted on a piston which is contained in a closed cylinder. The pistons are mounted on legs of the figure, the legs acting as piston rods. The legs are ground supportable and support the figure toy in an erect position. The sound is emitted when the legs and pistons are caused to move upwardly in the cylinders thereby forcing trapped air out of the cylinders past the reeds which causes the reeds to vibrate and emit the sound.

United States Patent Terzian et al.

1451 July 29,1975

[54] FIGURE TOY WITH VARIABLE SOUNDING 3,032,921 5/1962 Greene 46/118 MEANS 3,228,143 1/1966 Kaplan.... 46/1 18 x [75] Inventors: Rouben T. Terzian; Marvin 1. Glass, FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS both of Chicago, ll]. 1 208,321 12/1923 United Kingdom 46/118 491,220 2/1954 Italy 46/118 [73] Assignee: Marvin Glass & Associates,

Chlcago Primary Examiner-F. Barry Shay [22] Filed: Nov. 14, 1973 Attorney, Agent, or Firm-Coffee & Sweeney [21] Appl. No.: 415,673 ABSTRACT The present invention relates to a figure toy which will 46/1l\863;1{6/51/(2)3 move its mouth and emit a Sound when the my is I! nipulated in a Certain manner he sound is produced [58] Field of Search..; 46/1 18, 124 by a plurality of vibrating reeds each of which is mounted on a piston which is contained in a closed [56] References cued cylinder. The pistons are mounted on legs of the fig- UNITED STATES PATENTS ure, the legs acting as piston rods. The legs are ground 820,843 5/1906 Arnold 46/118 UX supportable and support the figure toy in an erect po- 1,561.829 11/1925 Cohn 46/118 sition. The sound is emitted when the legs and pistons 2,121,175 6/1938 Savage 46/124 X are caused to move upwardly in the cylinders thereby 22561340 9/1941 Gora et 46/124 forcing trapped air out of the cylinders past the reeds 2'479A88 8/1949 Goldfarb 46/124 which causes the reeds to vibrate and emit the sound. 2,618,894 11/1952 Nudelman et al. 46/118 2,968Q121 1/1961 Pearson et a1. 46/1 18 2 Claims, 4 Drawing Figures '26 k ut- :1] uh.

l a 42 s9 1 4o 1 1 1 1i i I i Z I I/ 4 1 r I 1 56 52 4 k a '1 5O 54 1 56 5o 60 Q; 16 l FIGURE TOY WITH VARIABLE SOUNDING MEANS BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to figure toys and in particular to figure toys which emit sound when manipulated in a particular manner.

Figure toys are known in which sound is produced by the action of some sort of bellows or other air actuated means within the figure toys. Such toys have often been popular with children since they require the expending of energy to operate and produce unusual sounds which are capable of keeping the childs attention over a substantial period of time.

In the present invention a reed type sound device is vibrated by the passage of trapped air past the reed which produces the emitted sound.

The principal object of the invention is to produce a figure toy which when properly manipulated will produce a series of short sounds of varying loudness and tone characteristics. A further object is to provide such a figure toy in which the manipulations will also cause a characteristic movement of a mouth portion of the toy. Further objects and advantages will become apparent from the following specification and accompanying drawings.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The sound producing mechanism of the present invention is shown in the form of a figure toy, or the like, which includes a cylinder, an air responsive sound device in the form of a reed mounted within the cylinder, and movable means associated with the reed and operable to create a flow of air past the reed to cause it to vibrate. The operable means includes a pair of movable spring biased legs which act as piston rods. A reed is mounted on a piston at the upper end of each of the piston rods which form the legs. As the legs and pistons are forced upwardly within the cylinders, trapped air in the cylinders is forced past the reeds to cause them to vibrate and emit a sound. A lower mouth portion is pivotally mounted below an upper mouth portion such that the lower mouth portion will flap up and down when the figure toy is manipulated. A pair of buttontype eyes on the head portion also simulate normal eye movement when the figure toy is manipulated.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the figure toy of this invention,

FIG. 2 is a partially broken away vertical section generally along a front-to-rear center line of the toy;

FIG. 3 is a partially broken away side-to-side vertical sectional view through the toy to illustrate the operation of the movable legs; and

FIG. 4 is an exploded view of one of the cylinders, pistons, and the cylinder caps.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT The figure toy of the present invention, generally designated 10, is formed in the shape of a chicken, including a head portion 12 and a torso portion 14 ground supportable on two legs 16. The head 12 is connected to the torso 14 by a section of corrugated or accordianlike plastic tubing 18 which is capable of being contracted and expanded in length or of being curved or bent preferably to give a weaving or bobbing action to the head portion 14. The head portion is formed of plastic or other suitable material and is generally hollow containing a simulated comb 20 and a rigid upper beak or mouth portion 22 formed as a unitary member with the head. A lower beak or mouth 24 is pivotally supported in the head 12 by means of a pin 26. The lower beak portion 24 is weighted in such a manner that the upper beak 22 and the lower beak 24 will normally remain apart, but such that the lower beak portion 24 will flap simulating the life-like characteristics of the prototype when the toy is manipulated. A pair of eyes, including a dark colored disc portion or button" 27 freely movable within a clear plastic hollow disc 28, are also provided on the head portion I2 to simulate eye movement when the figure toy is manipulated.

The torso portion 14 is formed in the shape of the body of a chicken, including a tail portion 30 and wings 32. Two cylinders 34 are mounted to the torso portion 14 substantially on the interior thereof and extend vertically from the inside of the back or top wall of the torso l4 downwardly through the bottom wall of the torso.

A sound-producing means is provided which preferably simulates the sounds made by the particular figure, such as chicken or rooster sounds. The sound producing means includes a reed 36 suspended across a slot 38 on the top of each of a pair of pistons 40. Each piston 40 is in the shape of a spool with two disc-like end portions 42 of slightly larger diameter than the central portion of the spool. The slot 38 on top of the piston 40 is connected to an air escapement or bleeder hole 44 through the vertical length of the piston 40. The piston 40 is connected to or can be molded integrally with the legs 16 of the toy figure. The legs act as piston rods for forcing the piston 40 upwardly within the cylinders 34 when a vertical downward force is applied to the body of figure toy as the toy is positioned erect on a supporting surface. Each leg or piston rod 16 is provided with a spline 48 along the entire length of the piston rod to prevent rotation of the piston rod 16 and piston 14. The lower portion of each of the cylinders 34 is closed by a cap, generally designated 50. The cap 50 is in the form of a disc having a small diameter portion 52 which fits within the bottom of cylinder 34 and a larger diameter portion 54 which is the same diameter as the outside of the cylinder 34. The cap 50 also is provided with a plurality of holes 56 to allow the escapement of air from within the cylinder, as well as a central keyhole 58 which guides the legs or piston rods 16. A coil spring 59 is fitted within each cylinder on top of the pistons to bias the pistons outwardly relative to the cylinders and the torso portion of the toy. The bottom of the legs 16 are provided with large simulated chicken feet 60 to support the figure toy.

The reeds on the two pistons may be of different sizes or shapes so as to produce a sound of a different pitch and tone in response to movement of one of the legs than in response to movement of the other leg. Thus, the user can produce a variation of sounds comprised of the two different sounds produced by the two reeds by simulating a wallowing or walking motion of the figure toy and by rocking it from side to side, as well as effecting simultaneous movement of the legs. In other words, the sound devices for each of the legs are both individually and simultaneously operable to provide varying sounds. In addition, each individual sound device has a varying sound emitted as the length of the sound chamber within the respective cylinder varies, and also the vibration of an individual reed is varied depending upon the speed at which a user biases the respective leg and piston into their respective cylinder to cause the air to pass the reed. During the manipulation of the toy the lower beak portion 24 will flap back and forth about pin 26.

Although the invention has been described in connection with a specific embodiment, it is understood that modifications are likely to occur to others working in this field and that such modifications could be made without departing from the principles involved.

We claim:

1. A sound emitting figure toy, comprising: a torso portion mounted on a plurality of elongated ground supportable legs independently movable in an axial direction relative to the torso portion, each leg including a piston slidably enclosed within an elongated closed cylinder in the torso which defines a sound chamber within the torso and with the legs acting as piston rods extending outwardly of the cylinder for engagement with a supporting surface, at least one vibratory reed mounted on each of the pistons and vibrated by the passage of air across the reed as the piston moves back and forth in the cylinder, and a spring within the closed end of the cylinder and bearing against the piston to urge the piston outwardly relative to the cylinder and thus said legs outwardly relative to said torso portion, whereby the sound emitted is varied as the length of the sound chamber within the cylinder varies and the vibration of the reed is varied depending on the speed at which a user biases either of the legs and pistons into their respective cylinders to cause the air to pass the reed, the legs along with their respective pistons being independent and being positioned to be simultaneously operable by a user biasing said legs against a supporting surface to force said pistons into their respective cylinders whereafter the springs return the respective legs and pistons outwardly relative to the respective cylin der.

2 The toy of claim 1 wherein the figure shape of the toy is that of a simulated chicken. 

1. A sound emitting figure toy, comprising: a torso portion mounted on a plurality of elongated ground supportable legs independently movable in an axial direction relative to the torso portion, each leg including a piston slidably enclosed within an elongated closed cylinder in the torso which defines a sound chamber within the torso and with the legs acting as piston rods extending outwardly of the cylinder for engagement with a supporting surface, at least one vibratory reed mounted on each of the pistons and vibrated by the passage of air across the reed as the piston moves back and forth in the cylinder, and a spring within the closed end of the cylinder and bearing against the piston to urge the piston outwardly relative to the cylinder and thus said legs outwardly relative to said torso portion, whereby the sound emitted is varied as the length of the sound chamber within the cylinder varies and the vibration of the reed is varied depending on the speed at which a user biases either of the legs and pistons into their respective cylinders to cause the air to pass the reed, the legs along with their respective pistons being independent and being positioned to be simultaneously operable by a user biasing said legs against a supporting surface to force said pistons into their respective cylinders whereafter the springs return the respective legs and pistons outwardly relative to the respective cylinder.
 2. The toy of claim 1 wherein the figure shape of the toy is that of a simulated chicken. 